Your Power.

Your Community.

05

May

2016

|

12:00 AM

America/New_York

Perspective: Safe And Sound

At the end of every day, we want everyone to go home the same way they arrived.

It’s an easy thing to say, but hard to deliver with the type of work we do and the number of vehicles we have on the road. Electricity helps us live our lives more comfortably, but it’s also inherently dangerous. I don’t ever want to make a phone call to tell a loved one their father or wife has been injured at work. That is why we take steps to ensure they are safe while they do their job.

Did you know a hole the size of a pinhead in a lineman’s rubber glove could end his life? So, we check them regularly and replace them every other month. The plastic liner in a bucket truck protects them, too. Using a dielectric test for the bucket liners, we immerse the liner in a tank of water and make sure the water inside stays neutral while we shock the water around it. If there are cracks or holes in the liner, the water inside would become energized. When at work, our linemen would be in danger in those buckets, so we test regularly.

We want the same protection for our community, which is why we offer education to safeguard the public. Using Power Town and our safety demonstration trailer, we work closely with schools to educate students about the dangers associated with electricity and with EMTs and firefighters to help them work safely in hazardous areas. We make necessary decisions to trim trees, which means we’re keeping children from climbing trees growing too close to power lines.

At Jackson EMC, we have a strong safety culture and we have an obligation to protect the public. Every employee spends at least 20 hours a year focused on safety education. We are all certified in CPR, First-Aid, fire safety and defensive driving. This training keeps us safe at work, but it also helps us protect our community.

Safety is important to me, but I know it’s important to everyone who works at Jackson EMC. I know this because we’ve asked. Our employee survey tell us that people who work here feel safe. Our strong safety culture is due to the hard work from each and every employee. Kudos to our safety team: Tim Sweat, Steve Chambers and Terry Jones who work to train our staff, keep our equipment tested and stay active educating the community to be sure everyone is safe around electricity.